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Quotes

Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged.

—John Wilkes Booth, 1865

Let him who desires peace prepare for war.

—Vegetius, c. 385

It is a certain sign of a wise government and proceeding, when it can hold men’s hearts by hopes, when it cannot by satisfaction.

—Francis Bacon, 1625

Whether for good or evil, it is sadly inevitable that all political leadership requires the artifices of theatrical illusion. In the politics of a democracy, the shortest distance between two points is often a crooked line.

—Arthur Miller, 2001

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

—Lord Acton, 1887

Do that which consists in taking no action, and order will prevail.

—Laozi, c. 500 BC

No human life, not even the life of a hermit, is possible without a world which directly or indirectly testifies to the presence of other human beings.

—Hannah Arendt, 1958

O citizens, first acquire wealth; you can practice virtue afterward.

—Horace, c. 8 BC

I’m president of the United States, and I’m not going to eat any more broccoli!

—George H. W. Bush, 1990

The U.S. presidency is a Tudor monarchy plus telephones.

—Anthony Burgess, 1972

In politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly.

—Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1830

I am no courtesan, nor moderator, nor tribune, nor defender of the people: I am myself the people.

—Maximilien Robespierre, 1792

Why has the government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice without constraint.

—Alexander Hamilton, 1787